Recently, Ding Lei, member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and CEO of NetEase, received a formal written reply from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology of the Proposal on Unifying the Standard Port of Intelligent Electronic Equipment Charger to Further Reduce E-waste to Help Carbon Neutrality. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said that vigorously promoting the integration of charging interfaces and technologies is conducive to reducing e-waste and improving the efficiency of resource utilization.
Since then, due to the storm of a public account article being asked to be retracted, a discussion on "whether the charging standard should be unified, and whether the standard will stifle innovation after unification" has aroused network concern.
On January 16, Xiang Ligang, an expert in the communications industry, told reporters that the unified charging interface has many benefits for consumers, whether it is from the perspective of saving costs or convenience of use.
A letter of deletion sparked heated discussion
Recently, the author of the public account "Fisheye Observation" said that he received a legal letter from the legal department of NetEase, asking it to delete the manuscript and apologize. It is reported that on January 12, the public account "Fisheye Observation" published Yu Ping's article "Why Ding Lei is Wrong". The article believes that whether the charging interface is unified should be handed over to enterprises and the market, and the premature unification of technical standards will stifle the motivation for enterprise innovation.
After the article was published, the author said that he received a deletion letter from NetEase and expressed his dissatisfaction, and then Ding Lei issued an apology letter to the author, saying that he had received the article forwarded by a friend and learned that the matter was controversial.
The retraction storm has triggered a hot discussion on the Internet, will the unification of charging standards stifle competition in the end?
In this regard, Ding Lei mentioned in the apology letter that the team before the proposal did a lot of research and found that this problem is indeed a pain point for many people. Ding Lei believes that in the initial stage of the development of a new technology, free competition will promote the rapid formation of technological innovation, and after the technology is gradually formed, the industry or government needs to formulate certain norms.
"This kind of regulation is not only not a shackle to the hands and feet of innovation for the market, but also leads the industry to develop in a more healthy and orderly direction," Ding Lei said.
The reporter learned that on January 10, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology made a formal written reply to Ding Lei, member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and CEO of NetEase, on the "Proposal on Unifying the Standard Port of Intelligent Electronic Equipment Charger to Further Reduce E-waste to Help Carbon Neutrality" (hereinafter referred to as the proposal): Vigorously promote the integration of charging interfaces and technologies, which is conducive to reducing e-waste and improving resource utilization efficiency.
According to the written reply, with the rapid iteration of charging/data interface and charging technology, the current intelligent terminal market has formed a pattern dominated by USB-C interfaces and coexisting with multiple interfaces and charging technologies. After the user replaces the device, most of the original chargers and data cables are idle, resulting in huge waste. Vigorously promoting the integration of charging interfaces and technologies is conducive to reducing electronic waste and improving the efficiency of resource utilization.
The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said that the relevant departments will organize relevant scientific research institutions and upstream and downstream enterprises in the industrial chain to jointly carry out the development of charging interfaces and technical standards for intelligent terminal equipment based on the development status and needs of the industry.
In addition, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology also said that it will accelerate the formulation and issuance of the "Implementation Plan on Accelerating the Comprehensive Utilization of Industrial Resources", deeply implement the pilot project of extending the producer responsibility of electrical and electronic products, and promote the integration and unification of charging interfaces and technologies.
expert:
The head enterprise is in a dominant position
Unified charging interface or affect revenue
Nandu reporter learned that most of the current smart phones use USB-C interface, and almost only Apple uses lightning interface on the market. While Apple has used a USB-C charging interface on devices such as the iPad Pro, the iPhone has been using the Lightning charging interface since the iPhone 5.
Lightning interface
USB-C interface with TypeC
Xiang Ligang, an expert in the communications industry, told Nandu reporter that at present, almost only Apple uses the Lightning interface on the market, "In fact, Apple also has many products that use USB-C charging interfaces, such as tablets, computers, etc." But why do some apple products not use usb-C charging interfaces? This is because the head enterprise is now in a dominant position and has a great right to speak. And if it is canceled, it may affect some of the revenue. ”
Taking Apple as an example, the price of Apple's 20W charger (lowest power) on the official website is 149 yuan. If you use a third-party charger and do not pass the Apple MFI certification, it is likely that when the iPhone is charging, it will prompt the charger to have a problem and cannot charge it. To pass the Apple MFI certification, you also need to give Apple a licensing fee.
The standardization of charging interfaces has actually become a global problem. Previously, the European Commission, the executive body of the European Union, and even the local agencies in the United States, also announced the promotion of electronic product standardization, and required that the subsequent production of mobile phones, tablets, digital cameras, PCs and other products must use TypeC interface, otherwise they will face huge fines or even stop selling.
At that time, Apple said that removing the Lightning interface from the iPhone would make the user's existing Lightning cable obsolete obsolete, bringing a lot of e-waste.
However, there is supply chain news that the next generation of Apple mobile phone iPhone 14 series basic confirmation will change the charging interface, from the original Lightning interface to the current Android mainstream Type-C interface.
Charger company:
Product competition does not conflict with uniform standards
Xiang Ligang further said that the advantages of the unified charging interface outweigh the disadvantages. "Now there are only two basic functions of the charger or data cable, one is charging, and the other is to transmit data. For consumers, after unification, you can buy less data cables for easy use. For the industry, it can also reduce the internal friction of the market. ”
A charger company insider told Nandu reporter that the incident gave the industry a focus point, rather than non-main business to become a weapon of competition. It believes that the unified agreement will not hinder competition, because "charging standards, not the standards of a certain type of product, the competition of a certain type of product does not conflict with the charging standard; the unified standard does not mean that the standard will not change, it should evolve, and the top technology is not able to benefit the public, this is what enterprises should do." ”
Telecom analyst Fu Liang said that in addition to Apple, even manufacturers using USB-C interfaces should actually unify standards. "Now many companies use fast as a selling point, but they will use many series or standards, some up to 120w, some 60W. These charging heads are also not universal. ”
Nandu reporter combed and found that 5G mobile phone sales are more and more, and 5G mobile phone power consumption is higher than before, in the mobile phone battery technology has no breakthrough development, fast charging is very important for mobile phones. Therefore, in recent years, "fast charging" has become the main gimmick of new mobile phone products. At present, OPPO, realme, millet, Nubia, Samsung, Lenovo, ZTE and other mobile phone manufacturers have also begun to launch their own high-power chargers.
However, Nandu reporter found that due to the current resource advantages of various mobile phone manufacturers to protect themselves, the brands cannot support each other's fast charging, and they all use different fast charging agreements.
The person in charge of the above charger manufacturer further explained that such as Huawei's fast charging head, only the fast charging protocol of the 22.5W power band is open, that is to say, most of the third parties can do 22.5W. The more popular 40W, 60W power band protocol is not open, the use of the original modular way in the sale, which also means that to fully meet their fast charging standards, third-party charger manufacturers can not do. "Private agreements are common among domestic brands and are not uniform." For example, "the same is true of Xiaomi, the charger has 18/27/33/55/67 power bands, but only 18/27 is open protocol".
Nandu reporter noted that at present, the 120W fast charging promoted by major brands is generally priced at more than 200 yuan. And the 120W fast charging of major brands is likely to not be universal, which also means that if consumers have multiple mobile phones at the same time, they need to buy multiple brands of high-power chargers when they want to try maximum power charging.
Fu Liang called for "unified standards, which is conducive to upstream and downstream standardization." ”
Comprehensive: Southern Metropolis Daily (nddaily), N video report